Coinage and Wages of 18th Century Londoners
Weiss
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Researching a post about the approximate value, in period-adjusted money, of wages in 17th century London, I came across this article. It's a pretty good non-numismatic peek at what coins were spent, and by whom, in this time period.
I've asked about this in the past and found lots of information, but I found this to be a quick, easy read from a pretty reliable source.
We are like children who look at print and see a serpent in the last letter but one, and a sword in the last.
--Severian the Lame
--Severian the Lame
4
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Interesting stuff!
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A fascinating article.
Neat!
I really enjoyed this article. Very interesting to get a better handle on living wages and cost of food especially to understand the value of coinage we collect. I thoroughly enjoy my farthing and half penny collections but I admit to being somewhat clueless as to why this coinage was so important for such a long period. The whole Conder token phenomena makes a lot more sense now.
It is interesting, but one has to consider that the salaries and prices are usually London based which for the most part were always higher than the provincial areas especially Scotland and Ireland where wages and prices were lower.
That's probably true. But wouldn't it kind of be a wash? You might pay 1/2 as much for a beer, but you also got paid half as much as someone in London?
--Severian the Lame
Interesting article, thanks for sharing! The real cost of rental housing in London doesn't seem so outrageous as the article suggests. If a "young boy chopping wood" is thought of as making $10/hr in today's wages, then 1s.4d in rent for an unfurnished room is a little over 10 hours of work, or $100/week. I wish I could get that kind of rent...